About Me

I work in Guatemala with Hope Haven international and Bethel Ministries. Along with my friends Chris and Donna Mooney and their family, we share the love of Jesus in various ways. Although giving out and maintaining wheelchairs is our primary ministry, we are involved in many other things as well. Building houses, feeding the hungry, providing education to handicapped children in orphanages and villages, and hosting a camp for the handicapped are just a small part of the things that God has given us the privilege of getting involved in. For several years now I have been keeping daily journals. Once a week I try to post new journals and pictures.
My e-mail is dick@dickrutgers.com
Guatemala Cell Phone # 502 5379 9451
USA Phone # 360 312 7720(Relays free to Guatemala)

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

I'm still alive and kicking, but not hard enough to hurt anyone.

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

It has been 8 days since I had surgery and although the Surgery went well the recovery has been a bit rough. I have been told that this was du to some leakage when they gave me the spinal but all I can say is that I am thankful that pain is now virtually gone. I am still very week and spend most of my time sleeping but feel a little stronger every day. Pat has been an angel and stayed with me most of the time that I was in the hospital. This was an extra special blessing because none of the staff at the hospital spoke any English and my Spanish usually ends up with one of the nurses bringing me a urinal when what I ask for was a drink of water.

On Wednesday I was released from the hospital and am now staying with Daryl and Wanda Fulp and they and their family are spoiling me rotten. It took about 5 days for the pain in my legs to let up that I could finally sleep for more that a few minutes at a time so needless to say I am now doing a lot of sleeping. My intentions of studying Spanish during recovery were put on hold because the Pain killers that I was on made it difficult to remember People's names even when I was looking in the mirror. Well that might be exaggerating it a bit but it leaves me with a good excuse not to study spanish.

On Friday Daryl surprised me by bringing over a few of my kids that he had gone all the way to Chimaltenango so that they could go to Youth Group in Antigua. Their visit was rather short but it was certainly the highlight of my day.

I can't say that lying around and having others wait hand and foot on me is all that easy but it has been a good experience. On the day that I went in for surgery Bethel had a wheelchair distribution down near the coast that neither Chris nor I would be able to attend. It frightened me a bit but I have watched Saul, Benjamin, Jorge and some of the others over the years and they have become confident in seating even the most difficult cases. Not only that they look to God and not to themselves for the wisdom in fitting the chairs while showing Christ's love to each and every person that they come in contact with. Explain to me why at the last minute Saul felt that they should load 12 extra wheelchairs onto the truck. They already had the paper work of each person that was coming to this distribution in hand and each of their chars were already on the truck. When Saul was asked why the 12 extra chairs he really had no explanation other then that he felt that this was the right thing to do. That evening they returned to Chimaltenango happy that everyone that had come to the distribution had received a wheelchair and happy that they had brought the exact number of wheelchairs that were needed. Gidincidence? Indeed it was!

Imagine it being your 21st birthday and your parents asking you how you would like to spend your entire day. Especially if you were in Guatemala where there are mountains and volcanos to climb, lakes and oceans to swim in a hundreds of other exciting things to do. Brittany, Daryl and Wanda's oldest daughter took no time in deciding. Brittany, her mom and dad, 2 friends and 8 brothers and sisters were all up bright and early Tuesday Morning to go and have the time of their lives. Brittany had decided that they would spend the entire day with the kids at Hermano Pedro. Her friends and entire family were as excited as she was. I don't know if Pollo Caperros will ever be the same but they and the kids that they took to lunch had the time of their lives. Did I feel bad that I did not feel well enough to come along? In a way, I love the kids at the orphanage and I never turn down a chicken dinner but just like the wheelchair distribution that I had missed, and the village that Daryl, Pat and some of the others visited a few days ago it does my hart good to know that there are more and more people answering God's call to come and share his love with a hungry and hurting world.

Yes I am getting anxious to get back out doing what I love doing best. I am sure I will have to moderate my activities for a while, (Right now my favorite seems to be sleeping) but God has been teaching me a lot lately and I am becoming aware that far to often we worry about what lies around the next corner when our main concern should be that we are walking the right path holding tightly to Him with the confidence that He is holding us with a grip that can never be broken.

Goodnight,

Yours in Christ: Dick

Both Daryl and Pat did a lot of writing about places that we went and people that we visited the week before I had my surgery. I can't imagine how that could possibly be more interesting than hearing about my prostate surgery but if you would like to read what they wrote,